Alice in Londerland
by SharpieMassacre
Summary: Finally free from being a subject of manipulation, Alice wanders through her new and mangled Wonderland. The borders between reality and the surreal have never seemed so indistinguishable. One-Shot


Alice in Londerland

June 2013

**Been replaying Alice: Madness Returns, and have gotten the writers bug after realizing how open ended they left the ending of the game. Disclaimer: I do not own this video game, it belongs to American McGee.**

**Summary: Finally free from being a subject of manipulation, Alice wanders through her new and mangled Wonderland. The borders between reality and the surreal have never seemed so undistinguishable. One-Shot**

Alice remembered walking this familiar road so many times before. The stone bricked road of a typical nineteenth century London clanked underneath her buckled boots. Similarly the buildings lining the streets were just like the ones from back home, all boasting simple Victorian architecture found in her lower class neighbourhood. For once during her murderous journey through Wonderland, she felt at home. Alice thought about it more, and she was sure she was back in London.

Wonderlands geography never once represented anything close to London.

The more Alice walked down the deserted and seemingly endless street, the more she realized she couldn't possibly be back in London. Most of the buildings were overgrown with moss and other green foliage, and some buildings had trees growing completely through them. She then spotted the giant mushrooms growing out of the buildings, and barely growing through the stoned road. Giant marbles, dominos, dice, and other multi-coloured mushrooms littered the sidewalks. For once Alice decided to look up, and noticed the giant cherry blossom trees cowering over the Victorian buildings.

She sighed heavily. One minute she thought she was back in London, then the next it seemed she was brought back to her surreal Wonderland. Now it seemed like her worlds were beginning to collide. Was this Wonderland with her memories of London trickling in, or London with her crazed illusions of Wonderland bleeding in? Was she in reality, or forever trapped in the surreal?

"Will I ever be able to escape this elusive Wonderland?" Alice thought aloud to herself.

Alice brushed her long brown hair over her shoulders and peered down at her short blue dress and blood stained white apron. She shoved her hands into one of her deep pockets, and she felt the wooden handle of something very familiar and deadly. Alice brought out her vorpal blade still covered in dry blood, and let her index finger dance along its fatal edges. On its own the blade seemed delicate and harmless, but in Alice's hands it was a blade bent on revenge to protect her sanity, and Wonderland.

So many creatures have died by the snicker-snack of her swift blade. Alice remembered plunging her blade into the throats of the Red Queen's Card Guards, and then stabbing it into the porcelain skulls of deadly Bitch Babies. She was a murderer, and she felt no shame saying it. Her Wonderland was a kill or be killed kind of world, and she had no intent to die when her sanity needed saving. If she died, then that meant her sanity did as well, and Wonderland at that.

There was one person she was glad her blade made contact with, and that was the Doll Maker. He was the man (or mangled creature rather) that was responsible for the destruction of Wonderland. He was the conductor of the Infernal Train, which brought forth the dark side of her Wonderland. As he drove the enormous train throughout all parts of Wonderland, he turned the surreal to the mangled and deadly. Giant forests were replaced with barren terrains and fire, beautiful creatures with killer ones, and of course the strange black ooze known as he Ruin burned every part of Wonderland it came in contact with. Even with his defeat, the destroyed parts of Wonderland were permanent.

The Doll Maker turned out to be nothing but a mental incarnation of her twisted therapist, Dr. Angus Bumby. After the house fire that killed her entire family, Alice thought his intentions were to help her with her anguish, madness, and hysteria caused by the incident. Now she knew she couldn't have been more wrong. He was the one who set her house ablaze, and his psychiatry help was nothing but a manipulative plot to get Alice to forget her past, and to cover up his murder. His true intentions for Alice were to erase all bits of her memory and to turn her into a sex object on the street. In reality she ended up pushing the man in front of a steam engine, but her mental incarnation of the man ended up being killed by her own blade. Both versions of his death signified her freedom from manipulation. Dr. Bumby would not be allowed to destroy her Wonderland any further, but of course the destruction he caused up until that point would remain permanent.

The nineteenth century architecture soon began to morph as she walked further down the street. The buildings became more and more burned down until they were nothing but rubble, all green foliage soon disappeared replacing it with a wasteland, and the surroundings soon became an excellent representation of one's hell. She looked up into the sky to not see any signs of trickling sunlight, but clouds of noxious brown clouds. The air smelled of charcoal and sulphur. Ahead of her used to be a crystal blue sea, but instead it was a sea of blood and Ruin. Below those waves used to be the Deluded Depths of the Walrus and Carpenter. The blood reminded her of all the twisted creatures she killed, and all her friends that ended up dying during her mind manipulation.

The Dormouse and the March Hare were dead, and the Hatter was presumed dead but he always seemed to sprout up after death. The Queen of Hearts was weakened, but most certainly alive in her domain. She was sure the Cheshire was aimlessly prowling around, but at this point Alice was sure he was dead. So many friends manipulated to the point of death. Wonderland was sure to consume everyone at some point, but she found it increasingly hard to call this place her Wonderland. It was part London, part Wonderland, all corrupted.

It was hard for Alice to take in that the man she looked to for refuge from her insanity, would be the one to corrupt her Wonderland. With his mental train of corruption he wanted to reconstruct her Wonderland into something much more sinister, perverted, and to his own liking. Of course Alice knew now that by changing Wonderland, he would be changing her mentality. Dr. Bumby did manage to change her mind beyond repair, but she knew he didn't take over entirely.

Even with both versions of her sick therapist dead, she could still hear the Doll Makers voice hush through the wind. "You're lost. And where your body is, your mind will follow. Perhaps, it's already there."

Alice stared intensively at her vorpal blade. "I'm not lost," she confirmed, "I just need to readjust to this newer Wonderland." She gazed down a side road to see it reforming to a run-down London street. She could just see the sign for the London bar known as the Mangled Mermaid, but it was overgrown with the black Ruin ooze. "I guess I should start calling this place Londerland if I can't tell the difference between the two. Am I really doomed to be trapped in this manifestation of my mind? I surely hope not."

Suddenly she heard the purr of the Cheshire Cat dance around her. It was a relief to hear another soul. "Alice, you don't know your own mind. You can't distinguish between the real and the mad." The grey cat appeared perched in front of Alice, baring its bloody yellow teeth, mangled body, and wide illuminating eyes.

"Blasted cat, what do you want? Can't you tell I'm in the middle of a pandemonium?" She tightly griped the handle of her blade.

"I can see that," the cat replied calmly, "You're just as fickle as ever."

"Cheshire, I thought that once I destroyed the Doll Maker and the Infernal Train that I would return to reality, not be stuck in this blasted mixed reality. What has happened to my sanity?"

"Silly Alice," the Cheshire looked slyly at the girl, "Ever since Wonderland began getting corrupted, your dependence on it has increased. You've created a brittle mentality where you are more dependent on your surreal world, than the real world to survive."

"Can I ever go back? I much prefer a world not full of surprises and horror," Alice placed her hands on her hips.

"Afraid not," the cat growled, "Your mixed Wonderland is more a part of you than ever. To composite for its corruption, your mind has manipulated the two worlds you have grown up with, and merged them into one in the hopes of giving you safe sanity."

Alice grumbled. This wasn't the outcome she expected after saving her mind from madness. She thought everything would have gone back to normal, and she would have woken up at the Asylum again out of a deep coma. Maybe her real self was dead, too mad to survive in a world of the sane.

"I guess I didn't have much waiting for me in London anyway; my families dead and I have nowhere else to go," Alice tried to smile, "I suppose I am safe enough here with all the killer creatures gone, the Red Queen suppressed, and the corrupted Wonderland only taking over some parts of the land."

"Don't worry Alice. Your Londerland is safe, for the time being," the cat grinned. He pointed his head farther down the street, and Alice followed his glare down the street, where she noticed an uncorrupted forest of Wonderland. Within that forest she could just barely see the Mad Hatter, Dormouse, and March Hare happily sitting at a table having tea. The mouse and the rabbit were no longer showing signs of dark corruption.

"How are my friends still alive? I thought they all died in Hatter's Domain…" A small smile crept on Alice's face at the sight of friendly faces.

The Cheshire replied with a sly grin. "They are more mechanical than flesh remember. How can your friends die if they weren't alive in the first place?" Content enough with his answer, Alice smiled and strolled down the Londerland street to have tea with some mad friends.


End file.
